Six: Take What You Have Gathered From Coincidence
In which it is discovered that one should not find enemies cute - coincidence rears an elderly head - Rei plays with fire - an old "friend" returns as a new one is made and - being all by oneself seems an appealing alternative after all.
"Well." Zoisite stretched out his legs, gave the downcast band of girls and their token prince a mildly disgusted look. "Obviously, I can't trust you to do anything on your own."
Mildly, Mamoru returned: "Oh, I didn't realise you were trusting us to do it on our own. I thought you weren't getting involved because you have a spine the consistency of water."
"Guys. Come on." Oddly it was Mako breaking up the burgeoning argument, pushing her hair back behind one ear. "We lost the nijizuishou last night. Just deal with it, all right? I'm sure we'll get the next one."
"You're very philosophical. What, did you not notice the man with the white hair, cape and phenomenal power, or what?"
Mako tightened her lips, but still managed a surprisingly polite: "He caught us off guard."
Zoisite, who apparently had no such compunctions about manners, laughed out loud even as he replied with an eyebrow arched ironically at the thunder senshi. "Funny how he managed to do that, even after I warned you about him."
"Zoisite, shut up." Mamoru's voice was even, but his eyes were angry; the tension springing up across the room was palpable and seemingly just seconds away from exploding.
"Guys?" Ami's tentative voice was like cool water, lapping gently at fiery tempers and begging for sense and calm. "Can we please not fight?"
Usagi's eyes were wide but agreeable as she glomped onto Ami's arm. Still, it was hard to tell if Usagi was being protective of her smart friend or begging Ami for some sort of protection for herself. "Yeah! I'm with Ami-chan – let's not fight!"
"The important thing now isn't that we lost the nijizuishou, anyway," Rei said, quite suddenly; the looks that this garnered her showed clearly that no-one was expecting Rei to be so pacifist. "We can get it back. I mean, we need to get another one back, so it's not like we actually created a problem for ourselves. We just made another one bigger."
"…and how's that a good thing?" Mako asked; she wasn't exactly discounting what Rei was saying, but it was obvious she didn't have a clue what Rei thought she was actually getting at.
"I didn't say it was a good thing. I'm just pointing out that we need to put things in perspective here. I mean, at least now we know what we're up against." With that said, she flipped her hair over one shoulder and turned a pointed finger on Zoisite. "You certainly didn't give us enough information to make us feel that way before."
Flipping his own hair in mocking mimic of Rei's own gesture, he intoned politely: "Excuse me."
"But you can make yourself useful now." Her voice was hard now, matching eyes that were those of a de facto leader. "Do you think he'll keep coming?"'
Even Zoisite seemed affected by Rei's assumption of an authority that she wore altogether too well. "What do you mean?" he asked, tone as cautious as it was suspicious.
"For the nijizuishou." At Zoisite's narrowed eyes – even like that the blankness was easily seen – she elaborated with odd patience: "You said he was the strongest of you. Why would he do something like this? I mean, is it just me, or isn't this something you could delegate?"
"To what? Youma?" Zoisite said with a snort that explained exactly what he thought of the efficacy of the lower Dark Kingdom denizens. "It's for the ginzuishou. Nothing is more important to Beryl than that damn trinket."
Usagi choked on a little bit of Pocky; she did manage to speak, however, once Mako had given her a hefty thump on the back. "So he'll be back?"
Giving the a-ok signal with one elegant hand to indicate a correct answer, Zoisite grinned without humour. "If Kunzite-sama turned up once, he'll turn up twice."
Strangely Mamoru entered the conversation fully only at this point; in fact it had seemed up until that point that he had only been half-listening thanks to Usagi. Now that he had accepted his strawberry Pocky collection was going to be decimated by the blonde senshi no matter what precautions he took, he was able to concentrate fully on what was actually going on. "Why do you still call him that?" he asked, ignoring the beatific grin on Usagi's face as she promptly inhaled three sticks of the cookie candy.
"What?" asked Zoisite, furrowing his brow as he gave Mamoru a look that could only be described as mildly disgusted. "It's his name."
"I mean that honorific. Surely he has no power over you."
Now the look spoke volumes about the fact that Zoisite clearly thought Mamoru was crazy enough to be committed under involuntary circumstances. "He'll always have power over me."
"How's that?"
Choosing not to answer that particular question, Zoisite looked away from Mamoru's too-piercing eyes and sought a change in subject rather successfully. "They've obviously found a way to lock onto the energy of the nijizuishou, to locate them without the kurozuishou. We should look up the next one, do something about it before they do."
"So you'll help us?" Usagi asked, offering the Pocky box to the blonde man as if she thought it were tangible evidence of a truce between them.
"Do I have a choice?" he asked with deep bitterness, ignoring the offered sweet.
Ami's voice was low, as she looked up from her omnipresent computer screen, smiling hesitantly at the man beside her. Of all the senshi, she seemed the only one willing to try and cheer up his dark mood with such care. "There's always a choice, Zoisite-san."
"What?" he asked with a sceptical look at her that would have had Ami wincing under usual circumstances. However, the blue-haired girl strengthened her smile and nodded.
"You don't have to help us," she explained, fingers stilled over the keys of her computer.
"Ami-san!" Mamoru's voice was aghast, the words echoed by Usagi in surprise. Neither seemed at all startled by the perfect synchrony with which they spoke, however.
Ami ignored them both, keeping dark blue eyes firmly fixed on the tense man at her side. "The choice is yours. It always has been." With a waved of a hand around the room she encompassed all who watched the conversation play out, as well as its actual two players. "We all made the choice to be here, Zoisite-san – and ultimately, so did you."
"I made no choice."
Ami's smile faded, but her resolve did not. "Didn't you?" She didn't touch him, but her words were strong enough to draw his eyes to meet hers. "Zoisite-san. Can you help us with Kunzite?"
He sounded both resigned and annoyed as he sighed, folded his arms over his narrow chest. "How do you expect me to help you?"
"He taught you, didn't he?"
"Taught me?" This seemed to amuse Zoisite in a way that not one of his companions could understand. "…well. In a manner of speaking, I suppose so."
"So surely you know something about him," Mamoru pointed out, like he was speaking to a three year old child.
That made Zoisite laugh again, a light broken chuckle that was enough to make anyone wince. Sometimes it didn't really sound he was laughing at all, because surely all laughter is supposed to have some joy in it, rather than just bleak emptiness. "Not enough to outsmart him."
"Sure about that? You just strike me as the type to think around problems…maybe not in the most subtle of ways, but I get the impression that if you want something badly enough, you'll find a way of getting it."
"Oh, that sounds dangerously like a compliment, Endymion-sama."
"Treasure it. I imagine that's the best you'll ever get out of me."
Zoisite abruptly slammed an open hand down on the arm of the couch, breaking up the banter sharply enough to make Usagi start and drop her precious box. "Look. I can't give you advice on Kunzite-sama's weaknesses."
"Why not?" Mamoru immediately challenged, eyes beginning to burn with the joy of getting into a decent tangle with a former enemy who was not yet quite an ally either.
"Because he doesn't have any weaknesses."
"Surely not. I mean, everyone has weaknesses."
"Not Kunzite-sama."
Rei broke in then, looking very unimpressed by this progression of the conversation. "What, so you're saying he's perfect?"
"I'm saying that any weakness he perceived in himself, he purged. He's made of cold, dark ice, Rei-san. You can't break him."
Ami's voice was very soft as she said sensibly: "But ice can melt."
Zoisite had no real idea what made him shudder – the words, or the fact that it was Ami saying them. Her earnest sweet face was painful to watch, and he found he could not look at her as he formulated a reply. "I wouldn't be so sure." Wanting to make her think of something else other than how to melt a man of ice, he threw out: "Besides, you have more to worry about than you know."
Mamoru raised an eyebrow, Zoisite's discomfort not escaping his notice in the slightest. "Beryl?"
"No." The smile that curved his lovely lips was rather darkly amused; the former shitennou resembled his former self more than anyone cared to acknowledge like this. "The girl who's watching you."
"…what?" Luna asked, startled out of staring at Ami's screen from the girl's shoulder.
"I saw a girl last night, out on the street. Or at least I heard her – she was with a man." Crossing his arms in what appeared to be a characteristically smug gesture, Zoisite raised an eyebrow. "She says she wants to meet you. Get involved. Interpret at will."
Rei's words were as sharp as the crack of a whip. "Who do you think that person was?"
A nonchalant shrug accompanied his unhelpful reply. "I don't know."
Usagi swallowed, one hand tightening about her handful of Pocky hard enough to crumble it to dust. Strangely she didn't appear to notice what she had done at all. "Was she an enemy?"
"She sounded concerned about you. And like I said – she wants to meet you."
Once again proving that it was impossible to predict the movements of her mind, Usagi suddenly piped up with a rather enthusiastic: "The princess!"
That wiped the wry half-smirk from Zoisite's face, as he sat up a damn sight straighter. "The princess?" he repeated with a wrinkled nose, disdain warring with total surprise at the very idea.
"The princess? You think she'd fight?" Mako asked, giving Luna a look. "I mean, I know maybe she's supposed to hold the ginzuishou and the moon-stick but…"
"And if she was the princess, why would she hide from us?" Rei might have been intending to sound as dubious about Usagi's wild theory as Zoisite, but it came out as simple confusion. "We're supposed to protect her, right?"
"This is so screwed up," Zoisite muttered, bowing his head.
Watching his odd body language quietly, ignoring the looks passing between all the others in the room, it was Usagi who spoke next. Directing her words at Zoisite, she asked: "…you really think Kunzite will go for the next nijizuishou?"
"Of course. He's not one to wait for anything he wants." He paused, and when he continued his voice was oddly gentle. "He's dangerous, Usagi-san. Very dangerous."
"He's really cute, though."
"…oh, for…" That was obviously more than the man could handle; with his Usagi-nonsense quota apparently reached and surpassed for the day, Zoisite pushed out of his place and promptly walked out of the small room.
"…why does he always do that when I start talking?"
"I think it's just because you were getting starry-eyed over a guy who used to be, like, his teacher, Usagi-chan," Mako laughed, the resonant sound breaking up some of the heaviness that had fallen across the apartment. "I mean, it'd be like…like someone telling YOU that they thought Haruna-sensei was hot!"
"Ewwww!" she shrieked, leaping to her feet in the useless movement of horror. "I didn't need to hear that!"
"So now you know how he feels!" The grin on Mako's face was wide and silly as she reached up a hand to pull Usagi back down to her seat. "Besides, he's like the enemy. He probably thinks you're a flake for that, too."
"I'm not a flake!" Usagi pouted, crossing her arms and back-sliding on the couch with the expression of a churlish rain-cloud.
Rubbing at his head, Mamoru decided that though once he'd thought it would be nice to have a younger sister to love and protect, being trapped in his own home with young girls was not making that childhood wish look all that sensible in retrospect. "Can we save the slumber party talk for later, please? Preferably for when I'm dead?"
Usagi sat bolt upright, blue eyes wide in horror. "You're not planning to die, Mamoru-san!"
"Well, if I have to hear about how nice a body that guy has, I might just wish I was dead," he pointed out wryly. Not waiting for Usagi's reply, he stood up and stretched his tired arms. "If I make Zoisite come back in here, will you drop it?"
Apparently not in the mood for an argument, Usagi slumped immediately back into Sulk Mode. "Why can't I just be a normal girl once in a while?"
"Because there's nothing normal about you, Usagi," he said quietly, holding her startled gaze for too long and far too strongly. A deep rich flush crept up Usagi's small face as her stomach decided to twist itself all up in knots; she continued to blush even when Mamoru dropped her gaze, got up, and left the room altogether.
Amused as she was by Usagi's shell-shocked look, Mako still decided to let her off for a few minutes yet. "…so you guys think that girl really could be the princess?"
Rei was shaking her head, though her quiet words seemed more a thought aloud than an actual contribution to the conversation. "Why would she be skulking around in the shadows instead of actually meeting us?"
"And she's got a boyfriend, too!"
"What?" Mako asked, dropping the troubled look she was giving Rei and blinking at Usagi instead.
"Zoisite said she was with a man!" the blonde immediately defended herself, nodding vigorously enough to make it seem as if her head were about to drop off.
"I don't think it's her boyfriend." Instead of being wearied or irritated, Luna's voice was distant; Usagi seemed to be through being perceptive for now, however.
"…then who was it?" she grumpily asked, folding her arms.
Any reply to that was interrupted by Zoisite; elegantly the slim man sailed back into the room to reclaim his previous place beside Ami. When he spoke it was airily, as if he hadn't stormed out at all; Mamoru rolled eyes at this as he took his own seat back. "What are we doing?"
"I guess we need to find the next carrier." That was Mako, speaking slowly as she took in the fact that Usagi still sulked while Luna and Rei appeared as distant as the satellite and planet they were affiliated most with.
Zoisite snorted, showing how truly impressed he was with the strategic skills of these girls. "Then what?"
"Get the crystal?" Usagi said bemusedly as she straightened up and reached for the remainder of her Pocky.
"Great plan. Can I paint the bullseye on your forehead, or what?"
"Zoisite-san, please calm down." Oddly that came from Ami; even more oddly, she laid a small hand upon his lower arm and he did not shake off the gentle touch. "You said it would take a while to locate the carrier? Could you define how long that while would be?"
"A couple hours, perhaps three." The words and tone were both surprisingly co-operative, but then it was becoming increasingly obvious that he appreciated a serious mind to deal with.
"I think we should try a fire reading on the princess." This caught everyone's attention, putting Rei firmly at the centre of it. "Even if this girl isn't the princess, we need to figure out both who she is, and where the princess might be." With a flick of a hand, she indicated Zoisite. "And I'm telling you, if you want to understand anything, you should let me do a reading with you."
It was Mamoru who spoke next, over-riding Zoisite's open mouth. "Why don't you guys go ahead? We'll call you when we've worked out how to find the next nijizuishou carrier and go from there."
"You really think it'll take that long?" Luna asked thoughtfully, seeming to drop whatever was bothering her mind to concentrate fully on the conversation still going on around her.
The snort Zoisite gave then indicated precisely what he thought of people who attempted to rush his genius. "Tokyo's a big place. I'll have to lock onto them." A second snort was far sarcastic as he then added snarkily: "And I do doubt we'll be lucky enough to strike another friend of Endymion-sama's."
Taking the Pocky from a wailing Usagi, Rei kept her eyes squarely on Zoisite as she asked: "Can't you do it at the shrine?"
"You want to break my concentration?" he returned sharply. "We'll meet you there, all right?"
Though Rei made a motion as if to continue the burgeoning argument, Mako's strong hand on her sleeve kept her back. It was in near-silence that the girls gathered their things and left the apartment; only Usagi's forced cheerful humming broke it up at all. Unfortunately, it did make Rei want to sneak up on her from behind and throttle her.
"Well?" asked Mamoru pointedly of Zoisite when they were at last alone; the question was slightly irrelevant when it became obvious Zoisite was already doing something with the shirozuishou. Mamoru did have to admit – the former shitennou might have a tongue in his head that would be better off ripped clean out, but he was very driven when he decided he wanted to do something.
But really? You knew that long before he started acting like he's on your side. Endymion-sama.
There was not much fuss to the small ritual that Zoisite performed. In an echo of how he had seen the man use the kurozuishou, Zoisite held it at arm's length before him and appeared to concentrate his mind on nothing but the softly vibrating crystal. The resonating energy grew, casting the room into darkness around them both; however the white light it generated was clean, pure. Standing in the shadows created by the light, Mamoru did not feel cast out. Rather, he felt warm, calm…like he could hear a distant voice singing a song that would guide him safely through all perils and trials between him and home.
"Well." Zoisite stretched his fingers out, let the crystal go; it hung under his own power in the air, the image it projected clear even though it wavered. "Off to the old folk's home, by the look of things."
Mamoru's eyes widened, the darkness suddenly feeling far more pervasive, far heavier than it had before. "I don't think so."
"I doubt we're going to find him at a kindergarten, Endymion-sama," returned Zoisite with rolled eyes; even though his eyes were fixed steadily on the crystal, he raised one hand to tug it through his long hair. "Would it really hurt you to think for five seconds?"
"…we need to catch up with Rei-san."
"Why?" The amazement in his voice broke Zoisite's concentration; the image dissolved like so much dissipated smoke as he moved green eyes to Mamoru's startled blue and the shirozuishou clattered to the floor.
"…because that's her grandfather…"
Queen Beryl smiled. Sometimes there was nothing more satisfying than the release of everything one had sought to seal away.
"So, this is the shrine Rei-san is obsessed with me coming to?"
Mamoru shielded his eyes, looked back down the leaf-strewn path before returning his gaze to the tidy building before them. "Oh, yes."
"Nice enough place," Zoisite granted rather grudgingly as he looked about with a critical eye. "Except maybe for him, he kind of spoils the ambience a bit."
"Who does?" Mamoru was not following Zoisite's gaze, instead preferring to take in the compound in his own way. The shrine had always calmed his restless spirit, but today – with autumn leaves falling like rain and dancing as if fairies across the smooth stone – the breeze felt…unsettled. It was as if something here were holding its breath, just waiting…waiting.
"The hippy."
That caught Mamoru's attention, and he whipped it around completely to the shorter man. "The what?"
He followed Zoisite's pointing finger to see a small but spry elderly man running after a far taller individual. Oddly, he was dressed in the traditional garb of a shrine attendant, though the image was certainly ruined by the mane of shaggy brown hair.
"Oh, and the nijizuishou carrier's with him," Zoisite added thoughtfully, apparently no longer bemused by the incongruous sight before them. "Just my luck."
"Hold it." Mamoru's sharp reflexes allowed him to catch the former shitennou's arm, stop him from moving forward despite the strength in those slim muscles that Zoisite still possessed.
"What? I thought you wanted it?"
"Sure, but it'd be only polite to give Rei-san some warning, before you bring the Dark Kingdom down on her elderly grandfather's head!"
"Oh, I don't know. He looks like he could handle it." And indeed, Zoisite was watching the little old man rain blows down on the helpless hippy with a broad smirk. "Hell, I'm almost wishing I was still working for Beryl – she'd love a youma who was just as useful in human form."
"I'll pretend I didn't hear that."
"Whatever. If we're not going to get it now, hurry up and point me at wherever those girls are."
"I suppose they'll be in Rei-san's room."
"You know the way to her bedroom?" This confession earned Mamoru as very appraising look indeed. "Despite the fact you dress like a moron and spout more crap than a sewerage outlet, I never would have pegged you for being interested in little girls."
"I'm not interested in little girls!"
"No, really, it's okay. Better that than…I don't know. Probably isn't anything much worse than that."
"You really think you should be addressing your prince like that?"
"You really think you're my prince?"
In the end Mamoru decided it was far more effective to ignore Zoisite than get dragged into one of his little "debates;" with that decided, he knocked on the frame of the door and slid open the paper screen. "Hey, girls."
Mako looked up from where she was sprawled across Rei's futon, sipping at a small cup of tea. "Hey, you guys sure got over here early!"
Zoisite, on the other hand, was holding his hand to his head and shaking it. Following his gaze it was easy enough to see that he was annoyed by the fact that Usagi was laughing her head off like some sort of demented hyena over a thick manga tankubon. "…look, would you just stop reading these damn comics and do something usef – oh, shit."
"What?" Mamoru asked, giving him a look that assured everyone present that he indeed thought of Zoisite something of a complete flake, former enemy or not.
The already pale skin was by now near-translucent; the faint shaking of one hand was able to be discerned even as he moved it swifter than the strike of a cobra to snatch the offending manga from Usagi's hand.
"HEY! That's mine!"
Rei was rolling her own eyes at this, apparently not yet bothered by the odd light in Zoisite's burning eyes. "Oh, for crying out loud, Usagi. It's my damn manga."
Zoisite was not interested in the apparent owner of the manga, however; he had already turned to the startled Ami to shake the small book in her face. "…who is this? Is she real? What the hell is she?" he demanded, the questions staccato and fired as rapidly as the ammunition of a machine gun.
"…um…that's Sailor V." Ami's eyes were wide behind her glasses as she reached up to adjust them, the movement of own hands belying a faint tremor of her own.
"Does she really exist, or is she just a manga heroine or what?" The question was urgent, and Ami was obviously not answering fast enough for he demanded in a near ugly tone: "Tell me!"
"Watch it," Mamoru warned from the doorway as he observed how helpless Ami was under the full onslaught of Zoisite's single-minded intensity. He had not moved to stop him yet, but the way he spoke assured all listening that he was on the verge of it.
Gathering her not inconsiderable wits about her, Ami swallowed and met the dark green gaze fully. "I don't know. She…she was an urban legend in England." She paused as she dropped her eyes, and then looked to her computer for precious back-up. "I think it all started about a year and a half ago," she said slowly as she tapped furiously on her computer, "and it then inspired the manga, the anime movies here. She's really very popular and people have claimed to have seen her both in London and Japan, but…I really couldn't tell you how real she was. Luna?"
The little cat sighed, looking more frustrated with her lack of knowledge than any of her companions could ever understand. "Pass."
"Why do you ask?" Ami asked quietly, removing her glasses as she looked up again at the too-pale man. He had retreated from her somewhat, but although his earlier fire had burned out he still looked deeply troubled. "What's wrong?"
"I know her." The manga's spine cracked audibly as he tightened his fingers on the book. "I…know her."
Usagi seemed to waver a moment between defending the helpless manga or staying on actual topic. In the end, she just said in a voice half-excited, half filled with trepidation: "So is she a senshi?"
"I don't remember any Sailor V," he dismissed, "But then I don't remember much. All I know…I know that I knew her, during the Silver Millennium." With that he flipped open the book, presented the page Usagi had been reading when he had originally glared over her shoulder. In the frame V-chan declared her affiliation with love and justice, hair wild about her masked face as she pointed accusingly at the villains of the piece. "This is only a drawing, sure, but there's something…do you have any photographs, Ami-san?"
"This is the closest they've ever come to proving she really exists," Ami confirmed, holding out the small computer so that Zoisite could see the blurry night-time photograph of the urban heroine.
He stared at it for only a moment, then looking away as if the image pained him to see. "She was part of Queen Serenity's court. I don't…"
Mamoru's voice was flat as it echoed through the room from where he still stood, leaning on the frame of the screens. "Is she the Moon Princess?"
"…I…"
"It would explain how you could have thought it was Usagi," Rei suddenly said, glancing between V-chan and Usagi with a critical eye. "Blonde hair, blue eyes…?"
Zoisite traced the symbol marking the girl's forehead for a moment; he then drew it back as if the inanimate picture had burned him. "She wears the sigil of the Moon Kingdom."
"We need to find her. Ask her if she is the princess…or if she knows where she is. Luna, what do you think?"
"I've never been told anything about her. I've asked." The cat's voice was frustrated, but there was an element of resignation about it that seemed very unlike the usually optimistic moon-cat. She wouldn't even meet the eyes of those around her, apparently preferring to watch the floor as if it held answers to all the mysteries of creation. "Maybe that's why. They didn't want us to meet her too soon."
Usagi's uncomplicated question spoke what all the senshi and their uneasy allies could not help but think to themselves. "Why wouldn't they want us to meet her?"
Rei stood up, command in every nuance of her movement. "I'll consult the fire." She then added wryly as she straightened her hakama, "…that is, if that idiot Yuuichirou hasn't already put it out. One day on the job, and he's already running the place into the ground."
"Yuuichirou?" Mamoru asked with a furrowed brow, though then his frown cleared as he realised what the name actually meant in the greater scheme of things. "Oh. Zoisite's hippy. I was wondering why I hadn't seen him around before."
Still, before Rei could confirm this one way or another, everything was interrupted by a tremendous crash from outside.
"What the hell was that?" Mako asked, already leaping to her feet and looking like she was spoiling for a fight. She was quickly at the door as Mamoru himself spun about to take in the scene before them, the tallest members of the group standing together as the voice of the old man reverberated through the entire room.
"JED! YOU'RE BACK, YOU WORTHLESS BUM!"
"What the…" Rei was pushing past Mamoru with the others hot on her heels. Her slightly unintentional swearing spoke well of the attitude of the entire group. "…holy shit, that's Jadeite!"
Zoisite immediately ducked back into the room, flattening himself against the nearest screen-wall. His lips were so tight as to be utterly bloodless, fingers clenched into fists at his sides. "He can't see me."
"What?" asked Rei with a frown as she cast a look back at the hiding man.
"Why?" Usagi echoed, with a blink that was enough to make a cow's blank look seem intelligent.
It of course garnered an absolutely incredulous look from the man who had once been their most efficient enemy. "You want to keep me around as your nijizuishou detector or what? He can't see me!"
Usagi looked outside to see Rei's grandfather berating the calm blond man before him, and winced at the familiarity of the attractive features. With the beginnings of a wail, she pulled back inside to direct at Zoisite: "I thought you said he wouldn't be bothering us ever again!"
"Well, it's just my flaming luck that Beryl changed her SOP the second I left the Kingdom!" He swore under his breath, looking at the shirozuishou he had just pulled from his pocket. "I can't believe this."
"I'm guessing he's here to get the nijizuishou!" Usagi said suddenly, eyes lighting up with both alarm and delight at her own mental prowess.
"…and what a guess that was." These words were echoed by Zoisite rolling his eyes skyward, before closing them tight. "Looks like you don't need me to test out whether or not the shirozuishou releases youma. Jadeite's bound to try it sooner or later."
Rei's own lips tightened at this idea. "I don't know if I want to wait for that."
Cracking one eye open as he tilted his head in Rei's direction, Zoisite pointed out politely enough: "I'm not going out there with this so long as he's around."
"Hey. Guys. This Jadeite guy?" Mako's words were incredulous as she turned from where she, Luna, Mamoru and Ami were keeping an eye on the returned shitennou. "He looks like he's apologising."
"Apologising? Huh. Being charming was always more Nephrite's way of getting stuff done, rather than Jadeite's. Wonder if the crystal scrambled his brain?"
"I'm beginning to wonder what scrambled grandfather's," Rei muttered, dragging her hand through her hair and scowling. "I'm busting his ass right now."
"That's probably not a good idea." Zoisite's voice was low in warning but sing-song enough to grate on the nerves of even a saint. Hino Rei was no saint at all, however.
"So what are you suggesting? I sit here and let that bastard screw around with my grandfather? I don't think so!"
Mamoru surprised all of those watching as he shot out an arm to block Rei's angry passage, eyes fixed firmly on the odd tête-à-tête playing out before them. "Just wait a second…let's see what he does."
"…he's walking away." That was Mako, adjusting the ball cap on her brown hair in a nervous gesture that was characteristic whenever she happened to wear the thing. It made Rei swear again, this time in a fashion that had even Zoisite looking suitably impressed at her range and inflection.
"I think grandpa just hired that bastard back! What the…"
Rei was on a roll and could have gone on in this vein for a much longer period had Zoisite not interrupted her. It was no intentional, however, and the words were more in fact directed at the shirozuishou itself. "Hey, it's—"
Ami frowned up from where she was frantically gathering data on Jadeite on her little computer; her eyes went as wide as dinner plates and she came very close to dropping the gadget altogether, "Zoisite-san! Stop it!"
"I'm not doing anything!"
But even though the slender man claimed he was not doing a damn thing, it was obvious why one would think that he was. The shirozuishou had shot from his grasping fingers across the site, glowing as white-hot as any poker left too long in a blazing fire. Before any of the girls could even think to react, it roared up to Rei's baffled grandfather and encased him in white light.
"NO!" Rei watched her grandfather collapse as the latest nijizuishou erupted out of his chest in a dazzling shower of sparks and light; the fire in her eyes was hard and furious as she turned to the dumbstruck man. "Zoisite, you lying scheming backstabbing bastard!"
"Whoa. Calm down. I don't think he did it – and we've got to get out there to – Rei!"
It was too late for Mamoru to salvage anything decent out of this situation, however. Rei was already racing out across the central square of the shrine compound, raven-black hair trailing out behind her like a banner of ebony. A crow screamed in the distance, sending a cool chill snaking down his spine.
Jadeite was himself staring at the fallen man in fascination, forehead creased. "Interesting development," he murmured, kneeling down in his pristine uniform to reach a gloved hand for the glinting crystal.
Rei slid into the dirt like a star baseball player going for the home run, one hand snagging the nijizuishou as she skidded past. Immediately she pushed herself back into a kneeling position that made her look as prepared as an enraged lioness for battle; still, not even those still far away in her room missed the flash of pain that crossed her lovely face as she stayed between her fallen grandfather and the blond shitennou.
"We have to help her!" Usagi said, already poised to run out screaming after her friend. Once again it was the steady hand of Mamoru that injected some sense into the situation.
"Transform," he advised. "You go out into battle, Usagi-chan, you go out there dressed for it."
"…chan?"
Usagi's wonder was of no consequence to Rei, who was still alone in her painful position with the crystal clutched protectively in one hand. "Back off," she gritted out, wincing as she tried again to put weight on a twisted and grazed ankle. "Didn't you hear me? I said piss off!"
He only shook his head at this, stepping forward with one hand held in a position that suggested sorcery was imminent. "I don't want to have to do this."
"Step away from the lady, creep!" The cry was from Yuuichirou, come onto the scene with a broom in hand and righteous fury in his eyes. Brandishing the makeshift weapon in the way a three year old might, he stepped closer to the blond man who wasn't even looking at him at all.
"But I will do it anyway if I must," Jadeite said with a sigh that was far too long-suffering to make any sense in context of the situation. With one simple swipe of his hand, Yuuichirou sailed through the air a full five metres before landing in the dust in a crumpled heap.
"Yuuichirou-san!" Rei's scream was strangled as she stared at the immobile man, eyes burning deep with rage and fear.
"He'll be all right," Jadeite said, causing her to whip her attention back to him with a heated hateful glare. "A bit of a headache, perhaps. But I didn't kill him."
"Like I'm going to believe that!"
Jadeite looked oddly surprised at that, perhaps even mildly hurt. "I had no reason to kill him," he explained, hands in a gesture near supplicating. That only made Rei scoff more as she tried again to get into a standing position from which she would not collapse.
"Like that would stop scum like you."
He seemed to have tired of the argument now, stepping closer to her with that hand extended again. "Give that to me."
Clutching the precious crystal to her breast, Rei spat in the dust at his booted feet. "No."
"Come on, Hino-san." Insultingly to the girl, his voice had actually become cajoling; it only infuriated her more to think that he would believe she would be done over by the kindness of a handsome man after all that he had done, and still wanted to do. "You know it would be so much easier for all of us if you just gave it to me."
"Go to hell and die."
"It's the other way around. At any rate, I do believe I've been there, done that already." Quietly he knelt before her as he closed a warm gloved hand over hers. "Now. Can I have the nijizuishou?"
"Get away from her, you creep!"
Straightening up, Jadeite turned his attention from the furious but injured Rei to the three girls standing at his back. "Sailor Moon. Long time, no see."
"Weren't you listening, jerk?" It was Mako with the names that time, hands on narrow hips and lightning flashing in her green eyes. "You may be cute, but we don't let Dark Kingdom flunkies off for that!"
That had Usagi giving her a sideways look that was rather surprised. "Don't we?"
"No! We don't!"
Rei rolled her eyes, but for once she was deeply glad of Usagi's battlefield nonsense. Steeling herself for the pain, she pushed herself to her feet and gasped. The agony lancing up her right leg did not stop her at all from turning and racing back across the compound to safety.
Sorry, Grandpa, she thought to herself as she flew with the wind. But I think you'll be okay for now…Sailor Moon and the others won't let that jerk touch you or Yuuichirou…I've got to protect this, for now.
"Where are you going?" Jadeite called after her, and the group might have been more taken aback by the blatant surprise in those words had they not been preoccupied with the task of kicking his ass.
Mako pushed in front of her group, hands still on her hips as she struck a pose. "You want her, you go through us."
Jadeite was pressing a hand to his forehead, oddly calm in the face of a rapidly degenerating situation. "This would all be over so much faster if you'd just let me have the nijizuishou, you know," he explained easily, giving them a look that might have been beseeching had it not been equally hard.
"Fat chance!"
Jadeite rolled his eyes, drew up his hands. "I don't want to do this," he warned, hands already beginning to glow with blue energy.
"Do what?"
Sailor Moon's inane question was very quickly answered by the strong beams of energy-rope that curled out from Jadeite's open palms; all three shrieked as they were promptly caught and pulled backward. Strung to the trees dotted about the central square, they struggled uselessly.
"Supreme…thunder!"
Jupiter's attack was directed back into her own body by the rope that bound her tightly; the only two girls could only watch in horror. "Jupiter!" Mercury and Moon chorused together; Sailor Moon struggled more strongly against her bonds with a surge of energy at the sight of her friends in pain and in danger.
I've got to help them, she thought fiercely, her moon-stick already coming to hand. This is what I'm here to do…to help my friends! And I'll do it and no Dark Kingdom flunky will stop me!
With the ball now back in Jadeite's court, it was time for the tables to turn again; Tuxedo Kamen used this opportunity to join the fray. Having hung back as something of a back-up plan to begin with, he now saw it was time to come in and save the day, as it were. With his cane at the ready in his right hand, a rose held tightly in the left, he came forward to give Jadeite a dark look of warning. "Let them go," he said calmly, cool command lacing every word.
"Oh. I forgot about you," Jadeite said, with one of those oddly patient sighs escaping him again. "Can't see how I could, mind you. Even back then there was always something so familiar about you."
"What are you talking about?" he asked sharply, the way in which he stalked closer intimating that he was not at all amused by the situation.
"Where's Hino-san?" With wary eyes Jadeite both dodged the question and kept watch as Tuxedo Kamen stepped carefully about him. "She's Mars, isn't she?"
"Oh, man! I forgot!" Sailor Moon's eyes were wide as something terrible forced its way into her brain at the half-heard words of the conversation between the two men. At Jupiter's questioningly blank look, she said agitatedly: "He knows who we are!"
"What?" Jupiter asked, quite baffled.
"Jadeite found out who we were!" Sailor Moon explained in an exponentially worsening panic to Jupiter, still struggling fruitlessly at her binds like a fish at the end of a line. "What if he tells Beryl!"
Back in the face-off, Tuxedo Kamen stilled and faced the shitennou straight on. "What do you want?" he demanded, the rose glinting in the sun like it was covered in dew.
"The nijizuishou." The question seemed to have surprised the first shitennou greatly. "And I'll keep her little secret, if she'll hand over the nijizuishou."
"Why are you telling me this?"
"So you can tell her." He motioned at the trapped girls, shrugging slightly as he did so. "I'm not sure that they can hear me." As he looked at them, however, a deep frown darkened his features. "Gathered another senshi, did you? But still missing the last, I see."
"What business is that of yours?"
"You'd be surprised." Shaking his head, Jadeite crossed his hands at the wrist; as he slid them up and apart he drew two swords of light from the air itself. Tuxedo Kamen had to hide his shock at the sight of the short swords; he had never seen Jadeite armed and he hadn't quite been expecting twin kodachi now. Also unexpected was Jadeite's mildly apologetic tone. "I don't particularly wish to fight you, Tuxedo Kamen. But I will go through you to get to Hino-san."
He tightened his wrist, held the cane as a rapier. "You can try."
The fight was brief but harsh; both men were fully on the offensive as the three trapped senshi watched helplessly. Though Jupiter tried again – without success – to loosen herself, they remained as trapped as they had been to begin with.
"This is hopeless!" Sailor Moon wailed as she wriggled painfully in the energy bonds; though the heavy weight of the moon-stick was comforting in her right hand, she was too far from the two men to be sure she could aim at the shitennou. "And Tuxedo Kamen-sama is in trouble!"
Indeed he was; the skill Jadeite was showing with the twin blades was overwhelming the man who had not held a true sword in a thousand years. He was driven to one knee with his cane blocking a double blow when a high voice interrupted the fight.
"Don't hurt him."
Tuxedo Kamen swore under his breath, and then raised his breathless voice to shout at the girl: "Stay back!"
Jadeite pressed forward, hard; Tuxedo Kamen fell back, hitting his head hard enough to knock him out cold. The shitennou paid no heed to this, instead turning with his swords held at his sides to approach the limping Rei. "Please give me the nijizuishou."
Her eyes were wide as she snorted at this; her stance did not weaken even as he stepped near-reverently over the fallen form of Tuxedo Kamen and came to stand before her. She gritted her teeth and held strong even with the screaming pain in her foot; not even the gentle hand that then came up to grasp at her throat could stop her from gasping out an incredulous: "Please!"
On the verge of screaming for Zoisite, the moon-stick beginning to hum softly in her shaking hand, all sound escaped Sailor Moon's mouth when a beam of bright golden light arced through the air and bit into the flesh at Jadeite's wrist. Immediately he drew back from Rei, the girl falling to her knees with the nijizuishou still clasped in her hands.
"Not too polite, is it? Messing with a cute girl like that." The slim form of the girl in the unfamiliar fuku was silhouetted against the sun at her back as she struck a pose atop the roof, but her voice was altogether too familiar to the other shitennou watching the scene from the relative safety of Rei's room with a blade of his own in hand. "Sailor Moon! Now!"
Too startled by the appearance of the blonde girl to notice her release, Sailor Moon could only stare with adoring amazement at the girl who had saved them. "Sailor V-chan!"
"Do it!"
"Ye-yes!" Hurriedly she turned to Jadeite, not wanting to let her idol down now. Grabbing her tiara and feeling it come alive in heat and light in her gloved hand, she shouted: "You're dusted!"
"Not going to try to heal me, Sailor Moon?" Jadeite asked with an arched eyebrow, not seeming at all concerned by his impending fate.
"What?" she asked, steady hand faltering on the blazing disc that had been her tiara; the memory of the moon-stick humming in her hand was powerful and her mind was set askew at the peculiar question.
…he sounds like he wants me to heal him…! But why would a shitennou…Zoisite didn't even want me to…did he?
"You don't need to, anyway." With a bowed of his head, he said politely: "Your secret is still safe with me, Tsukino-san, but you want to keep it that way…next time we meet over crystal, hand yours over."
The flung tiara passed only through thin air as Jadeite vanished completely.
"That jerk!" she cried, frustrated and confused. All those emotions were temporarily forgotten as she remembered something far more pressing and turned around to face the roof. Her blue eyes were as crestfallen as she saw that Sailor V had vanished. "No! Where'd she go?" she groaned, hands falling limply to her sides.
Things were silent for a moment as Mercury and Jupiter broke their defensive formation and split up; Mercury headed to where Tuxedo Kamen was stirring while Jupiter looked around and noted only Yuuichirou seemed without a nursemaid now Rei had gone to her grandfather. Sailor Moon only turned from where she stared at empty space when Zoisite walked slowly across the courtyard to her, a sword of silver and jade in hand. He seemed scarcely aware of the curved blade, however; his attention was firmly on Sailor Moon.
"Jadeite knew who you are?" he asked her quietly; she looked to him in surprise, and the nodded miserably.
Over hearing the words, Mercury looked up from where she was helping a groaning Tuxedo Kamen to sit up in the dirt. "He did," she confirmed, noting the sword held limply in Zoisite's hand but refraining from commenting on it as she noted his complete indifference to it. "So he never told Beryl then?"
"If he had told her, she would've told us. And then, Nephrite would've fried you long ago if he'd known, and she would have made sure he did." Zoisite looked down at the sword in his hand, frowning as if he'd only just realised it was still there. "And I guess that's the Sailor V mystery cleared up."
"But who is she? What's she doing?" Tuxedo Kamen asked as he touched the back of his head with a wince. "And geez. I never would've challenged Jadeite if I'd known he had swords like that…he always have those, or what?"
"No. I've never seen them before." But Zoisite couldn't help but think that that was not entirely true; he might have thought on it harder if Tuxedo Kamen hadn't spoken so suddenly.
"And since when do you have a scimitar like that?"
"It appeared just as I was thinking I would come out and play prince, rescue you," he said bitingly, swinging the sword lightly through the air. It vanished as he slowed its arc, Tuxedo Kamen's grasping hand touching only air. "Good thing Sailor V showed up. You don't need Beryl knowing I'm here, that's for damn sure."
"She helped us," Sailor Moon said, thoughtful and quiet as she knelt down beside Mercury, looking back over to Rei. For some reason she longed to hold the moon-stick again; uneasily she thought that perhaps it was going to be harder than she'd ever thought to hand it over to the princess…especially as she'd never really wanted it in the first place. "Didn't she?"
"Doesn't really mean anything though, does it?" Zoisite muttered, and closed his own eyes tiredly; he was rubbing at his left temple like his hand needed something to do now it was without the heavy sword that had felt so right in his grip.
Rei looked down at the crystal still in her warm grasp, then closed her hand around it even more tightly. One look at her collapsed grandfather and Yuuichirou had her clutching it so tightly her heart felt like it might explode. "We've got other stuff to worry about now."
"Yeah…yeah!" Letting her transformation lapse, Usagi got up to join Rei at her grandfather's side. "There's the ginzuishou…and the princess…we have to do it, don't we?"
"Sure, Usagi-chan," Mamoru said tiredly as his own transformed self faded. "All for the princess." With a weary effort, Mamoru managed to get to his feet to move to where Rei still sat beside her grandfather.
"Rei-san?" he asked her, his hand lightly on her shoulder.
"What?" she asked, not looking up from where she gently touched her grandfather's face; he seemed very peaceful, as if sleeping. It seemed the white crystal was kinder on its victims than the black, leaving them only deeply asleep for a period rather than metamorphosed into a dark creature who was enslaved to Beryl.
"Look after that nijizuishou, won't you?"
"With my life. Endymion-sama." She bowed her head so that her long hair fell across her face, masked her eyes. "I'd better get Mako-chan to help me get him inside."
Zoisite watched Rei as she, Mako and Ami made to pick up the unconscious man; the half-awoken Yuuichirou seemed to be impeding more than helping the situation, and Usagi acting a foreman was not helping matters at all. Instead of moving to help them, he walked carefully over to where Mamoru watched proceedings with a pained expression. It was difficult to tell if it was his headache or the scene before him causing the expression.
"What did she call you?" he asked mock-idly even as the lightly-swaying Mamoru opened his mouth to ask why he wasn't making himself more useful.
With a shake of his head, Mamoru shoved pride aside leaned on the former shitennou. "Looks like you're not the only one," he muttered, and winced at the pain in his head. "And you could at least help your prince inside."
Oddly, Tuxedo Kamen's brush off had him thinking only of Jadeite's odd behaviour. "No," said Zoisite to himself as he supported Mamoru's weight in the walk across the shrine, thoughts quietly scattered to the four winds. "Perhaps I'm not the only one after all."
END CHAPTER SIX